Category Archives: Resources

Book: Voices of the Arab Spring

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In Voices of the Arab Spring, edited by Asaad al-Saleh (Columbia, 2015), there are sections devoted to personal stories from the revolutions in different Arab countries. The section on Libya contains several essays:

  • My Mission in the Libyan Revolution by Mohammed Zarrug
  • Fighting Qaddafi: More Determination Than Weapons by Khairi Altarhuni
  • The Dark Night on the Tripoli Front by Abdulmonem Allieby
  • Fighting for Freedom by Ehab Ibrahim al-Khinjari
  • From School to the Battlefield by Yusef Mohamed Benruwin
  • Living Through the Libyan Uprising by Gay Emmaya Tongali
  • Benghazi, My Love by Adel el-Taguri
  • My Work in Revolutionary Libya by Annabelle Veso Faller
  • The Days of My Life by Ezedin Bosedra Abdelkafi
  • Blood for My Country by Aisha A. Nasef

Article: “Sokna re-examined”

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A new article discussing some old materials about the Berber (Amazigh) language of Sokna, an oasis in central Libya:

Souag, Lameen, “Sokna re-examined: Two unedited Sokna Berber vocabularies from 1850”. Quaderni di Studi Berberi e Libico-Berberi 4 : La lingua nella vita e la vita della lingua. Itinerari e percorsi degli studi berberi. Naples: UNIOR, pp. 179-206, 2015 [actually appeared 2016].

Abstract: “The Berber variety of Sokna, in west-central Libya, is rather unusual and not very well described. In 1915 it already had only five fluent speakers, and today only the old still remember a few words. The two vocabularies gathered by the English traveller James Richardson in 1850, previously unpublished, are thus important for the study of this variety, and by extension for the study of Libyan Berber more broadly. This article presents them for the first time, with transcription, commentary, and comparisons with the few previously published materials.”

(Anyone interested in a copy of the article, please contact the author)

Article: Italian colonisation and the walled city of Tripoli

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An article on the Italian period and its impact on the old city of Tripoli, available online:

Mia Fuller (2000), “Preservation and self-absorption: Italian colonisation and the walled city of Tripoli, Libya,” The Journal of North African Studies 5/4, pp. 121-154.

“Scholars periodically return to the study of how French administrators and architects handled the urban settings of North Africa – the ones they found and the ones they founded – beginning with the occupation of Algiers in 1830. Italian occupation of Libya began much later, in 1911, but in the 32 years of their effective rule, Italians had sufficient time to be both destructive and constructive in significant ways. Nonetheless, only a handful of scholarly efforts have been devoted to Italian architectural and urban policies in Tripoli;
and very few of those have been concerned with the walled city at all…”

Book: Organization and Social Structure in Libyan Oases

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ghadames-chart-eldblom1968

Organization of cultivated land in Ghadames (pull-out chart from Eldblom, Structure foncière, 1968).

In the late 60s, the Swedish scholar Lars Eldblom published an extremely detailed study of the socio-economic life in the three Libyan oases of Ghadames, Ghat, and Mourzouk. Since life in Libya has changed dramatically since then, his work undoubtedly documents pheno-mena of oasis life that hardly or no longer exist. It is also full of detailed maps and figures, based on painstaking research. Because of its high level of detail it certainly deserves to be better known. The book is:

Eldblom, Lars. 1968. Structure foncière. Organisation et structure sociale. Une étude comparative sur la vie socio-économique dans les trois oasis libyennes de Ghat, Mourzouk et particulièrement Ghadamès. Lund.

He also published an English summary of the book, under the following title (available freely online):

Eldblom, Lars. 1971. Land tenure – social organization and structure: a comparative sample study of the socio-economic life in the three Libyan oases of Ghat, Mourzouk and Ghadamès. Uppsala University: Nordic Africa Institute.

And finally, I have also found an earlier study of his focusing especially on irrigation in the oases of Brak, Ghadames, and Mourzouk:

Eldblom, Lars. 1961. Quelques points du vue comparatifs sur les problèmes d’irrigation dans les trois oasis Libyennes de Brâk, Ghadames et particulièrement Mourzouk. Lund (Lund Studies in Geography 22).

Article: The second Ottoman period in the writing of Libyan history | العهد العثماني الثاني في كتابة التاريخ الليبي

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هنا نقدّم مقالةً عربيةً للمرة الاولى و هي مقالة “العهد العثمان الثاني في كتابة التاريخ الليبي” من الباحث الالماني ياكوب كرايس.

في مجال تاريخ الولايات العربية تحت السيطرة العثمانية تحتل ليبيا مكانة خاصة بالماقرنة مع البلدان الاخرى في شمال افريقيا لأنه كان ارتباطاً وثيقاً بين اعادة الاحتلال العثماني لليبيا و اعادة التنظيم للامبراطورية الشاملة. اذا من الممكن، في مشاريع التحديث العثمانية في ليبيا، اكتشاف التناقد بين التطور الاضطهاد. و لذلك يعتبر تيار من البحث التاريخي الدولة العثمانية كقوة استعمارية كغيرها، بينما يشير بعض العلماء الى اهمية التراث العثماني في العالم العربي. اما المؤمرخون الليبيون المعاصرون فلهم ايضاً وجهات نظر مختلفة: هناك باحثون مهتومون بالتأثيرات السلبية للاصلاحات العثمانية، من جهة اخرى ينوه مؤرخون اخرون بنتائجها اليجابية و في نفس الوقت هناك اتفاق بين التيارين بالنسبة الى التضامن الاسلامي ضد الغزو الاستعماري الايطالي.

Abstract: “In the history of the Ottoman Empire’s Arab provinces Libya occupies a special place, compared to the other North African countries, insofar as the Ottoman reoccupation of Libya went hand in hand with the reorganization of the empire as a whole. It is thus possible to trace, in the Ottoman reform projects, an opposition between development and repression. That is why one strand in historical research considers the Ottoman Empire as a regular colonial power, while some scholars, on the other hand, emphasize the importance of the Ottoman heritage in the Arab world. The contemporary Libyan historians, for their part, have also different points of view: there are those researchers who are interested, above all, in the negative influences of Ottoman reforms, whereas others stress the positive outcomes. At the same time, there exists a consensus as far as the Islamic solidarity against the Italian colonial aggression is concerned.”

Libia 1911-1912: Immaginari coloniali e italianità

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Gabriele Proglio, Libia 1911-1912: Immaginari coloniali e italianità, Mondadori (2016).

From the publisher: “L’Italia va alla guerra per conquistare il suo ‘posto al sole’ senza realmente sapere cosa troverà sull’altra sponda del Mediterraneo. Il volume analizza la propaganda coloniale e, in particolare, la stretta relazione tra la costruzione narrativa della colonia libica e le trasformazioni dell’italianità. All’iniziale studio degli immaginari sulla Libia precedenti il 1911, segue una disamina di quelle voci che si mobilitarono a favore della guerra, partendo dai nazionalisti di Enrico Corradini con i riferimenti all’Impero romano, al Risorgimento, al mito della ‘terra promessa’. L’archivio coloniale è indagato anche attraverso lo studio delle omelie funebri per i soldati caduti durante la guerra, con immagini che vanno dal buon soldato al figlio della patria. Un altro campo d’analisi è quello dell’infanzia: i discorsi dei docenti sul conflitto, del «Corriere dei Piccoli» e della letteratura per ragazzi lavorano per «costruire» i corpi dei piccoli italiani. Non manca, infine, lo studio della letteratura interventista: Gabriele D’Annunzio, Giovanni Pascoli, Filippo Tommaso Marinetti, Matilde Serao, Ezio Maria Gray, Umberto Saba, Ada Negri, Giuseppe Bevione.”

Article: The Sanusi Letters: a checklist | قائمة رسائل السنوسية

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From “The Sanusi Letters: A checklist”, by Knut S. Vikør. Available freely online.

“The obvious importance of the Sanūsī order has made it one of the better studied movements of nineteenth-century Islam. Traditionally, however, the movement has been known mostly from external sources, in particular French colonial observers, and from overviews such as those of E.E. Evans-Pritchard and Nicola Ziadeh. There exists, however, a rich body of material from inside the order. They include the scholarly works of its masters, but also non-literary material such as letters of various types. In recent years, more and more of these have been published in various works on the Sanusiyya. They are, however, spread throughout many publications and it may be hard to obtain an overview of them. The present list is a survey of known letters to and from the Sanūsī order.”

Documentary: Libya’s Revolutionary Musicians

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A new documentary,  Stronger Than Bullets by filmmaker Matthew Millan, about music during the Libyan revolution is now available through Al-Jazeera English:

Amidst the bloody revolution to overthrow Muammar Gaddafi, a defiant music scene emerged from the dust of war. After 42 years of non-Arabic music being banned, Benghazi suddenly resounded with a melodic fury, with hip-hop, heavy metal, rock, blues, and even country music echoing around the city.

“Stronger than Bullets” introduces the musicians who are free to play at last, and follows them as they stand shoulder-to-shoulder, guitar to rifle, alongside rebel fighters.

After months of war, Gaddafi’s death paved the way for the musicians to celebrate their victory with a triumphant music festival. Yet when the tyrant fell, shadowy elements emerged to halt the festival at the 11th hour, as victory descended into conflict and chaos.

Soon the situation came full circle back to the days of the tyrant, and the musicians had to scatter to the four winds. Will the music scene thrive once again, or will it remain mired in post-revolutionary blues?

http://players.brightcove.net/665003303001/SJg0bzqkZ_default/index.html?videoId=5178293746001&autoplay

Annotated recordings in the Tripoli dialect | تسجيلات مشروحة في لهجة طرابلس العربية

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Several recorded texts in the Arabic dialect of Tripoli are available freely online as part of the database COCOON (“collection of digital oral corpora” in English), originally from CorpAfroAs (“Corpus of Afro-Asiatic Languages”), a France-based project for the description of languages of the Afro-Asiatic language family.

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The recordings were made by Christophe Pereira, a specialist in Libyan Arabic, whose linguistic annotations and translations are also available.

These recordings are useful for linguists who want an idea of how Tripoli Arabic sounds or need a few transcriptions for comparative research, as well as for those teaching courses about Arabic dialects who could benefit from some material from Libya (of which there is not enough!).

Documentary: La Pionnières

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La Pionnières (“The Pioneers”) is a documentary depicting Libya’s first democratic elections in 2012, the first after four decades of dictatorship, through the eyes of two women. It is produced by Vanessa Rousselot and presented by La Huit. I have yet to see the film, and would welcome comments and thoughts from those who have. The description is as follows:

“In July 2012, Libyans experienced their first national democratic elections after 42 years spent under the dictatorship of Qaddafi, 6 months of civil war, and more than 20,000 deaths. For the first time, women could participate in elections. They 625 to try their luck. “Pionnières” depicts a country at a historic moment through the struggle of two women. During the revolution, Myriam El-Tayab, in resistance against her own family, was beaten while pregnant. She wanted to build a country in which both supporters of the regime and revolutionaries could live together in peace. Layla El-Sounoussi traverses 400km of the desert region of Mourzouk, in the south-west of Libya, to go speak to men as they leave mosques in order to teach them what democracy is all about and why women should participate in political life. This rare document captures the short period when Libya seemed headed along the path of democracy before sinking again into chaos.”

“En juillet 2012, les Libyens vivent leurs premières élections démocratiques nationales, après 42 ans passés sous la dictature de Kadhafi, 6 mois de guerre civile et plus de 20 000 morts. Pour la première fois, les femmes peuvent se présenter aux élections. Elles sont 625 à tenter leur chance. « Pionnières » donne à voir un pays dans un moment historique, à travers le combat de deux femmes. Pendant la révolution, Myriam El-Tayab, s’est battue, enceinte, en première ligne de front contre sa propre famille. Elle veut construire un pays dans lequel supporters de l’ancien régime et révolutionnaires vivraient ensemble, en paix. Layla El-Sounoussi arpente les 400km de désert de la région de Mourzouk, au sud-est de la Libye, et va parler aux hommes à la sortie des Mosquées pour leur dire en quoi consiste la démocratie et pourquoi les femmes doivent participer à la vie politique. Un document rare faisant état de cette courte période où la Libye semblait emprunter le chemin de la démocratie. Avant que le pays ne sombre dans le chaos”